Meaning and Purpose

When I first began studying grief, I learned about a model called “meaning-making.”  At first this angered me because I did not think that I could come up with a meaning for Alby's death. It made no sense that he left us in the middle of our lives together.  I also felt that my own life had lost its meaning, even though the work I was engaged in continued and even ramped up since I was now trying to complete it alone.  I puzzled over the idea of meaning for a long time.

Dr. Robert Neimeyer, an influential leader in grief counseling and therapy, talks about meaning making as a way to rebuild your life after loss.  In the reconstruction model of grief counseling, the story becomes a pathway to transformation. By telling the story of the loss and of the relationship, you can find points of connection. Through the narrative, you might discover new activities, new passions. As I worked through my own story of loss, I slowly understood that by living a meaningful life, I would discover its new purpose.  By finding connections from our relationship, I continue to bring him forward into my life now.  In other words, the meaning in my life moves through our shared story and finds purpose in the stories I am creating and the work I do in my life now. In other words, there was no meaning in his death but I can make meaning in my own life, afterwards.

Many of my clients talk about a loss of purpose.  One young woman feels that it is important to focus on her purpose now that her shared plans with her boyfriend will not come about. Even as she cries, she seeks meaning in a penny on the ground, a hawk in the sky. She visits places they intended to go together and looks towards finding a more satisfying job to enhance her career, as if she is being invisibly encouraged by him. An older woman struggles to find meaning in other parts of her life besides her work which, although it gives her a true sense of purpose, does not supply enough meaning to fill the hole left by her husband. She seeks connection with her adult children, in remembrance of their loved one. A mother, mourning the sudden death of her daughter, searches for purpose now that she no longer has this child to guide. It will take her a while to rekindle any sense of meaning after this death. A young man, struggling with issues of growing up, leaving childhood friends and bad habits behind, longs to create a meaningful career to shape himself as an adult.

It's a common theme although we each have our own unique story to tell. Listen to these stories that you tell yourself and others. Notice where the connections are. Notice your own themes and see if they will lead you to a new sense of purpose.

 

How have you rediscovered meaning and purpose after death or a difficult transition? Leave me a message - I'd love to read your response.

Beauty and Flowers

There is nothing like death to make you appreciate life.  While depression and sadness lurk around the edges, the center holds so much beauty. Right now in midsummer, my garden is blooming with lovely flowers, some of them taller than me. Feathery cleome nod in the breeze and Echinacea and bright yellow daisies peek out from under a tree. I planted a few cana lily bulbs in the spring without any sense of what they might grow into and now, there are this amazing bright red flowers, bobbing on tall stalks with red striped leaves. I am filled with amazement that I put them in the ground and they turned into these gorgeous surprises.

Alby was the gardener; it was part of his character that he could grow things. He had a magic touch with the earth; when I first met him, he planted almost an acre of vegetables down the hill from our house. He would set a pot of water to boil, run down and harvest his corn – from garden to table within 15 minutes. He grew flowers and got very angry when he discovered he was actually growing deer candy. He planted herbs for me to use in our meals. He tended the garden of our lives and after he died, I just could not take on the plants in his absence.

I have nearly always killed houseplants, although I have had more luck with the outdoor kind, but he was tending them. Friends have given me cuttings of jade, spider plants, lovely trailing things that flourished in their own homes. “You have to water them,” they would chide. I watered them, gave them pretty pots to live in but still they withered and died in a matter of days. I decided that I am just not a gardener at all.  But this year, I changed my mind.  I decided to channel some of Alby’s ability.  I planted an herb garden in one of the few sunny spots around the house and now, in addition to my flowers, I have an abundance of three kinds of basil, rosemary, tarragon, oregano AND marjoram, and a thriving sage plant.  There is an old wives’ tale that where a sage thrives, a strong woman lives. So here I am, world! I am growing plants and they are beautiful, strong and some of them are even tasty. Pesto, anyone?